How Did You Survive?
by Tears Falling Freely
Summary: Sora sells his soul to survive. His hold is slipping slowly but steadily. What happens when it breaks? Warning: Character Deaths.


Warnings: Selling oneself; Otherwords; Someone prostitutes themselves in this. MaleXMale relationships otherwords; Yaoi. Cursing; Name calling.

A/N: This was inspired by the Seether song Love Her. You should listen to it while reading if you can/want to.

Disclaimer: I do NOT own Kingdom Hearts or its character or Seether or it's song Lover Her.

* * *

Riku stared stonily at the marble stone sitting innocently in the ground. Riku felt a crushing pressure behind his eyes but he refused to let his tears fall. He bit his lower lip when the tears felt ready to fall. He couldn't help remembering as he stared at the tomb stone.

* * *

Riku was walking home from work when movement caught his eye. He had been walking in front of a shadowed alley illuminated weakly by a dim lamp. Curious he turned towards the alley's opening and what he spotted caused his nose to scrunch up disgustedly.

A tall body had another bent over at the waist with its hands against the wall. The person's head was bowed and the one behind the bent over person was pounding into it.

Riku shook his head and turned to walk away when the male pulled out and pulled up the pants that were around his ankles.

"Here's your money!" the person reached into his pocket and dumped the money on the ground.

"Dirty whore."

Mumbling, the person turned and walked away, continuing down the alley.

_'Damn prostitute. Why can't all of them find a hotel, no one wants to stumble across that?'_

Riku determinedly turned to walk away when he heard a whimper, the sound of someone suppressing sobs.

Riku's conscious started to speak up.

_'He called her a whore and threw money at her,'_ Riku argued back.

_'Why do you sound so defensive? Besides, he could have just done that to make her feel worse.'_

Riku gave in reluctantly and turned back around, walking slowly to the body that had come to rest on its knees.

The person's head was downcast so Riku could only see brown spiky hair. The person was naked, clothing torn to threads on the ground. That was when Riku got the nasty shock of learning that the person he previously thought was a girl was a guy.

Riku's lips curled in disgust, shaking his head in exasperation.

"You are a prostitute, aren't you?"

All was silent for a while before the male answered.

"Yeah, what's it to you jackass?"

The answer was hostile but there was an underlying sad hopelessness to it.

"Nothing, just thought prostitutes went to hotels."

The persons snorted.

"I hate people like you, always so ignorant," a pause, "You think I do this for fun? Well, it's no use talking to you, you'd never understand. No one would."

A sudden flicker went off and than a nearby lamp lit up, letting Riku see the boy fully.

Dull blue eyes were peaking at him every once in a while and than the eyes would shoot downwards. Fair skin was a may lay of scars all over his body, some crisscrossing each other. They were on his arms, his neck, his upper body, and his lower body. Some of them were really nasty, some even still gaped open.

Riku frowned. He noticed that the brunet was now looking fully up at him. He turned and walked away with only one comment left.

"You really are a whore."

* * *

After that night Riku walked past that same alleyway and each and every time he'd watch as the same guy would finish up, throw the money, and call the boy nasty names. He'd go down the alley, ask if he was okay and when he got nasty remarks he'd throw one back and leave.

He did this every night for a week. As he did this, halfway through the week he started to wonder how the kid survived with all the sadness that he seemed seeped in.

It was when he went to his friends, who happened to be lovers, Leon and Cloud's house, that he learned anything about the brunet.

He had been waiting in the living room while Leon and Cloud got dressed that he saw it.

It was a picture that was sitting on the bookcase. It was on the third shelf and met his eyes perfectly.

He walked closer. It was the boy from the alley, the prostitute. In this picture he was smiling happily, clinging to a spiky blond haired, blue eyed young man that looked kind of like Cloud.

"The kid is Sora and the one that looks like me was Roxas."

Riku turned around and stared at Cloud as he stepped forward, in front of Leon.

At Riku's questioning look Cloud elaborated.

"Sora was my nephew. Roxas was my younger brother and Sora was his son."

"What happened to them?"

"Well, Roxas had a heart attack and Sora was going to come to live with us but he said he already had a place and I didn't want to force him. He was sixteen so I agreed. It's been a year since that time."

So he was only a year younger than Riku.

* * *

Another week passed, Riku still routinely did the alley on his way home from work. Maybe, if he had been more open, he could have admited to be slowly forming affection for the brown haired prostitute.

That was when he had officially run into Sora at a place other than the alley.

* * *

He had been invited to a Christmas party that Cloud had convinced Leon to throw in their house. It was around the time that he had been entertaining the idea of letting Sora stay at his apartment just for the winter, considering how cold it got in Traverse Town.

He didn't want Sora's death weighing heavily on his conscious if Sora died just because he didn't have a temporary place to stay for the below freezing weather of Traverse Town.

That was when disaster struck his plans.

* * *

He had been by the buffet table when he saw Cloud traveling over with someone hiding behind him.

"Riku!"

Cloud started jogging, wanting to get to Riku before he moved away.

"I have someone I want you to meet."

Riku had been half turned towards the table so he turned toward Cloud fully as he came closer, knowing it was too late to move away.

Cloud slid to a stop before Riku, reaching behind him to clasp the person's wrist. Riku watched curiously as the person was dragged out from behind Cloud. Riku's eyes widened, feeling shock at seeing Sora dragged out from behind him.

Sora had made sure to cover his body, hiding the scars. He wore a long sleeved turtle necked black shirt and black slacks and black dress shoes with black socks.

The black looked weird on Sora, for some reason Riku had seen him as the type to wear bright colors.

Riku himself was wearing a red silk button up long sleeved collared shirt, black slacks, and black dress shoes with black socks.

Sora's own eyes had widened but he quickly masked that and smiled warmly.

_'How can he smile after all he's been through?'_

Riku smiled back and looked to Cloud.

"Is this the Sora you were telling me about?"

"Yes, this is my nephew and godson actually. Why don't you get to know each other? I think you'll both get along."

Riku looked skeptically at Cloud but Cloud ignored it and walked away with one last smile.

Sora sighed, his smile slipping easily off his face. He turned away from Riku without a word and walked to the sliding doors that led to the back yard.

No one was out there because Cloud and Leon's house seemed to be where all of Traverse Town's mosquito population resided.

Riku followed without a thought, figuring that this was the perfect time for the questions that had been plaguing him since his mini talk with Cloud about that picture.

Soon they were walking side by side around the perimeter of the yard which was an acre big.

Evidently the silence was eventually too much for Sora when they were half way around the yard because he started talking.

"You know . . . I've been doing this since I was ten because my father was a drunkard after mom died. He lost his job eventually and couldn't support us, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. He eventually died from alcohol poisoning. I didn't want to burden Cloud and Leon so I convinced Cloud that I had a place and I left. I've been staying with Axel, Roxas' drinking buddy and lover."

Riku blinked at the over flux of information bombarding his ears.

Sora snorted derisively, looking at the ground, not daring to look Riku in the eyes or even stare in the general direction of his face.

"I don't even know why I'm talking to you, you're a stranger after all. This is the fourth town I've done you know. Dad didn't care where I went as long as I brought in money. All that concerned him was drinking and making sure Axel helped pay for the beer. Looks like being a whore runs in the family. The money I made went to the house and the money he made off of Axel went to the alcohol."

"So, now you know my life story. That is what you wanted right? Seemed that way anyway, or do you want a round?"

Riku's eyes were wide with horror.

"How did you survive?"

There was only silence and a feeling of despair in the air.

"I never wanted either really, I was just wondering how you survived. Why aren't you dead?" Riku pestered again, desperately wanting an answer for some reason.

"Is that what you want, me dead?"

"How can you lie, smile, and pretend everything is alright?"

No answer but he hadn't really expected any.

* * *

Riku stayed away for a while after that, busying himself with work, and that was something he would regret for the rest of his life.

* * *

Riku was walking towards the alley when a desperate scream startled him.

"Why have you forsaken me?" the voice pierced the night, ripping through the silence.

Riku's body jerked with the force of that scream. He ran to the opening but paused and hid next to the opening, peering over the side of the wall he was pressed against.

The man was walking away as he always did and Sora was naked again. He was kneeling and was facing the alley's opening, where Riku was hiding.

Eyes closed, tears leaked down his face, escaping slowly from the tightly clenched lids.

Hopelessness had settled on his face as he opened his eyes and looked around desperately. Slowly blankness descended as he realized he was alone, mind carefully blank.

Riku murmured in his mind.

_'You're not alone, you're not.'_

A quiet whisper echoed eerily through the alley.

"I'm all alone."

Loneliness seemed to encase Sora's features as he groped around on the ground for something.

His right hand seemed to close on something and when he lifted it Riku nearly ran to Sora right than and there.

He watched as Sora placed the knife over the place where his heart beat hollowly in his chest.

Riku couldn't watch so he turned and started to walk away. He didn't get far enough to not hear a squelch and the thud of the body as it hit the concrete surface.

He closed his eyes as he walked away towards his apartment with the knowledge that Sora was slowly bleeding to death on the ground.

* * *

Riku had kept his head down during the funeral.

The next day after the alley Riku had gone back there, gathered Sora's body and brought him to his apartment to clean him up and dress him so that his scars didn't show.

He did this because he knew that Sora wouldn't want anyone to know even now.

Cloud, Leon, Riku, and people Riku didn't know showed up at the wake and funeral. He saw someone he assumed was Axel standing near the casket with another red head.

With they way their hands were intertwined he knew that they were together. He thought he recognized the other redhead as Reno, a subordinate in the company Riku was an executive for.

The wake lasted three days and the funeral happened on the fourth day. He was buried in the clothes that Riku had dressed him in, Riku managing to convince Cloud that the coroner didn't need to examine Sora.

He had even convinced everyone that Sora had wanted a closed casket, Riku having been there when Sora had nearly drowned, Riku saving him soon enough to be able to hear his last words. At least, that was the story Riku had cooked up. He had even let Sora's corpse to soak in the bath tub for a while to make it more convincing.

Riku had punched Axel and broke his nose during the funeral after the casket had been lowered.

Riku had even stayed after the funeral for a few hours, well after everyone else had left.

* * *

It had been two months after the funeral that Riku found himself in front of the tomb stone again, still wondering how Sora had survived the years that he had been selling himself and essentially his soul.

Maybe he'd never understand like Sora had said the first time they had met but it didn't matter. Sora was dead and nothing would change that.

"I'm sorry you died alone Sora, like you always were. I was scared and it was cowardly of me."

He had always felt guilty that he had let Sora die alone, proving to Sora that the world was a cruel and unfair place, and maybe it was.

Even though it was a corpse that couldn't feel anything, he felt guilty for leaving Sora still alone, even in death.

He felt guilt that Sora would never know how much he had cried for him that night.

He felt guilty that no matter how alone he had felt, Sora had someone that cared for him, even if that person wasn't Riku.

Cloud had cared about Sora but he hadn't been able to see that because of what and who he was.

Maybe Riku would have been able to care for him if they had been allowed more time.

Still, it didn't make a difference now, Sora was dead and it would stay that way, even if Riku could have killed himself for leaving Sora empty and cold, and absolutely alone even in the afterlife or whatever there was.

Riku turned to go, leaving Sora alone one last time, planning on never returning.


End file.
